OSX is great but in terms of productivity, Apple has been left in the dust. iWork has the potential to be amazing, but Apple has neglected one of the most significant reasons why most people use computers - to get work done.

Apple always develops in the shadows with products that in plain sight: see Nike Fuelband.

Apple is probably the most valuable R&D partner that a new,ground breaking company could have leading to an acquisition: see Liquidmetal. Material science- reinvented.

Apple has already cascaded unimagninable technological disruption with just simple, yet profound design of harmonized software and hardware design: see IPad transforming EHR use in healthcare.

Apple has reinvigorated computer science and engineering by creating the most efficient design, secure deployment, revenue fair applications program ecosystem in history: the App and Mac App Store.

Apple is supercharging silicon development ONCE AGAIN with its acquisition of PA Semiconductor and through its mastery of worldwide supply chain synchronization and procurement system and forking ARM microprocessor technology towards the development of the Apple A5, 5X and A6 processors now in products. Never forget PowerPC that brought the behemoths of Apple, IBM and Motorola. Probably should not forget that Apple and Motorola did create the 68000 series....

Apple learning about the domination of the living room through development and usage learning through its Apple TV project. Technophiles watch out, there are many set top boxes that are ready to suffocate the cable tv market. Just like the music industry before it, cable tv will need to learn that lack of innovation in having users sift through massive content will have subscribers leaving in droves from high cost and content suffocation. The economy will reward Apple as it will release a solution (possibly a product line franchise like the iPad) that will be the iPhone of TV- the everything to everyone solution with competitors surviving with copies of the technology.

Now, here's the scary part of what the Two Steves built...take a vision of how humans experience life and improve it through the intersection of technology and art. You now tap that creativity of luminaries like Jony Ive, Phil Schiller, Bob Mansfield, Eddie Cue, Tim Cook et. al. that can implement the scariest idea of all: merging all the aforementioned technologies as evolving threads into products we haven't possibly come close to imaging yet. Apple TV- done- just build it, iRadio- hold on folks, this will be as close to ESP as one can get (really calling it iESP would be magical). IWatch- the synchronous fusion of everything that Apple has been working on as a launchpoint into what we always expect of Apple- Everything.

The press initially panned the iPad. Now its paper world is being eaten away by the iPad and a cohort of shark hungry Android competitors as if they were chub.

Despite what many people believe, and despite them sometimes describing themselves as a "software" company, Apple actually has a long history of "okay" or mediocre software. I can't think of much they have made that really knocks it out of the park except for the base OS and the developer tools. The actual user software Apple has made has been uniformly "meh" or has been bought from others.

For instance iTunes is actually what made the iPod special in it's day and it's competitors had noticeably clunky alternatives, but Apple didn't make iTunes, they bought it from another developer. What they've added to it over the years arguably makes it worse than it originally was. iWork apps were created only to spite Office and the very second they got good enough to be viable alternatives all development practically ceased. iWork was made to sell more hardware. Apple isn't really interested in making a good suite of Office apps and they certainly aren't interested in making anything better. They just need a "good enough" competitor and that's it.

Quicktime probably comes closest to software that Apple made that is "stellar" but again, it was only made in response to Microsoft's attempt to dominate the media format wars, and has (again) dropped off in quality significantly now it isn't needed to sell hardware anymore.

IMO Apple doesn't actually make great or fantastic software. It makes "good enough" software that is actually kind of patchy in terms of quality and they never stand behind it either. You can never tell if Apple really is serious about a software or service or whether it's just something that will disappear next year when the hardware and market priorities change. You can't really *rely* on Apple's software.

Uh, your entire post is pretty much horse-shit. Apple's entire success has largely been based on software, not hardware. If the software was shit it wouldnt have mattered how good the hardware was. OSX and iOS are both best in class, brilliant pieces of software that were both ahead of their times, and superior in many, many ways to competing offerings. You attempts to dismiss all of Apple's software using odd justifications is absurd at best. There are dozens and dozens of examples of Apple's software frameworks, paradigms, and concepts which consistently have been adopted by the rest of the computer industry, and moved things forward in a big way- from underlying technologies, to consumer apps like the ILife suite, to pro apps like aperture and final cut, to utilities like time machine, to iOS and its apps, Apple has consistently innovated both in the underlying technologies, and the forward facing UI and software features and have made previously complex tasks simple and intuitive, using extremely powerful software. If you consider Apple a "mediocre" software developer, I'm not sure what company on this planet you would consider to be more proficient, especially in such wide areas.

I suppose I subscribe to Malcom Gladwell's assertion that there are many people that are just as capable as people like Steve Jobs and Einstein, but are not in the right place at the right time for the circumstances to elevate them to an "outlier". Einstein was no doubt smart, but the reason he is the "gold standard" of genius is simply because society decided to make him that. He's no smarter than millions of other people.

If only you were born in the right place at the right time. Then you could be that "gold standard" that you likely believe you are.

Seriously, it's obnoxious to see a guy spend so much effort trying to tear down a great mind who accomplished more than 10 of you ever will and give him a big "meh, he got lucky. Millions could have done the same thing". Except they didn't.

Ok- you bought a droid- that's fine. But you are a moron for stopping development of iOS apps. You DO want to make money, right? Just because you don't use iOS doesn't mean you don't develop for it. It'd be insane not to.

Hence, why I think you're a troll.

Don't waste time responding to this idiot - he's clearly a troll outed in the first thread he started flooding. He'll soon get the idea if people ignore him (or block).

An editorial written to rile up the reader base and it appears to have worked.

"Has Apple lost it's magic?" is not the right question to be asking. It's subjective and it suggests that if Apple has 'lost it's magic' that this will somehow hurt their business. Apple is one of the most profitable businesses in the world and they're going to remain profitable for years to come with their current business model.

OSX is great but in terms of productivity, Apple has been left in the dust. iWork has the potential to be amazing, but Apple has neglected one of the most significant reasons why most people use computers - to get work done.

Really what a waste of a comment, since majority of people work in corporate world and their companies force them to use windows products. Apple has been left in the dust, really, suppose being most successful IT company at present, is being left in the dust. Do you think Apple are worrying about Microsoft's market share in the corporate world, since Apple understand it will take time to change that scenario and our in no rush, BUT I can tell you MS think every day how to catch up Apple because of the consumer market and how is that working for them.

Uh, your entire post is pretty much horse-shit. Apple's entire success has largely been based on software, not hardware. If the software was shit it wouldnt have mattered how good the hardware was. OSX and iOS are both best in class, brilliant pieces of software that were both ahead of their times, and superior in many, many ways to competing offerings. You attempts to dismiss all of Apple's software using odd justifications is absurd at best. There are dozens and dozens of examples of Apple's software frameworks, paradigms, and concepts which consistently have been adopted by the rest of the computer industry, and moved things forward in a big way- from underlying technologies, to consumer apps like the ILife suite, to pro apps like aperture and final cut, to utilities like time machine, to iOS and its apps, Apple has consistently innovated both in the underlying technologies, and the forward facing UI and software features and have made previously complex tasks simple and intuitive, using extremely powerful software. If you consider Apple a "mediocre" software developer, I'm not sure what company on this planet you would consider to be more proficient, especially in such wide areas.

OSX is great but in terms of productivity, Apple has been left in the dust. iWork has the potential to be amazing, but Apple has neglected one of the most significant reasons why most people use computers - to get work done.

I use a Mac at work, it does get work done. Plus I don't need antivirus software running in real time taking resources away. Now get back to work, flipping burgers kid.

While it may not make sense for some apps, it does for about 80% of them.

It is good for Users, Developers, the Apple Halo, Apple and AAPL.

This blows away the competition:

Microsoft doesn't have the mobile apps to compete on the Windows 8 Desktop

Google doesn't really have a Desktop to run its mobile apps

This would be BRILLIANT if Apple can make it happen.

One other suggestion: Make iWork and iLife available for Windows. For a price.

The beauty of bringing iOS apps to the desktop, is that almost all of iOS apps already run on the OSX desktop via the iOS Simulator. Currently, some iOS features are not implemented and only one iOS app can be run at a time... But, I see no reason that these limitations could not be elegantly resolved.

The point of this is to make the bulk of your interaction with Apple Solutions as transparent and seamless as possible -- as with iOS, the device and the OS disappear. My data is already available everywhere I go -- why not my user experience?

Edit: Maybe all those colored squares on the WWDC banners represent iOS apps running on the OSX desktop... You activate (touch or click) one -- which brings it into the focus (the forefront) of your attention and interaction -- just like on the iPad... Resize the content and controls as desired... Activate another, rinse and repeat.

I totally agree with making iLife and iWork available on Windows and Linux desktops.Edited by Dick Applebaum - 6/9/13 at 1:10am

"Swift generally gets you to the right way much quicker." - auxio -

"The perfect [birth]day -- A little playtime, a good poop, and a long nap." - Tomato Greeting Cards -

Apple has zero interest in expanding applications onto Windows and it should not waste resouces doing so. Apple has absolute interest in expanding applications on OS X and iOS.

Nothing is stopping 3rd party iOS apps from expanding onto OS X. That's up to third party devs.

I disagre in that I think that Apple should make iLife and iWork apps available on Windows... For the exact reason that they made iTunes available on Windows -- it makes iDevices easier to sell -- and introduces the "Apple Way" to non-Apple users (the halo).

I assume that iLife and iWork would be actively enhanced and maintained... Lean and mean!

Scenario: Start creating your document, spreadsheet or preso with iWork instead of Office -- then access it seamlessly among your computers and mobile devices. It won't be acceptable for the "power" Office users... But for the millions of Moms, Dads, Kids and Grandparents... I/They don't want or need the Office bloat on any of their computers or iDevices.

"Swift generally gets you to the right way much quicker." - auxio -

"The perfect [birth]day -- A little playtime, a good poop, and a long nap." - Tomato Greeting Cards -

"Agreed, hardware is easy for Apple, I want Apple to take software to the next level and blow my mind. I have no pre-planned ideas, but Apple have set the standard for software development and looking to be amazed. If I am not then hopefully, it will be major upgrade that keep Apple ahead of the pack."

The thing is they are already way ahead. I have recently worked on the Sumry app which is a way to create instant slideshows. We have an iOS client and an Android client, I wrote the iOS client and 'dabbled' only a little in the Android client which was written by a colleague. The problem with the Android client is the API's are so lacking in the area of media handling. The app includes an audio mixer that combines a number of raw sound files into a single audio track. On the Android app I put 2 weeks into creating this code, on the iOS app the hard part was done in a couple of hours thanks to the fantastic Apple media API. Not only does Android lack critical API's but it also includes very half baked ones. For example there is a media codec API for handling audio, but it simply does not work. Or if it does, no one outside of the API development team has managed to figure out how to make it work.

So the problem here is one of perception rather than fact. Apple is very much ahead in software on these devices, so why doesn't the world know this. I blame marketing rather than technology for this.

I think Apple loose the way since Snow Leopard, it completely abandon a huge number of computer and users with the 10.7 Lion system requirements, then the iLife and iWork package lacks good and innovative updates. Not to mention that some of those apps seems more abandonware than supported. In the last years it's all about iPhone, iPhone, iPhone, and in my opinion, iPhone is basically the same every year, it lacks functionality, it's good for the mass market, the ones that don't need to attach a computer code file to an email, what seems impossible to do on an iPhone for example. That mass market is also very volatile, it can change system like it change t-shirts, Google Android is very developed with some phones that are more powerful than my MacBook, Windows 8 - Xbox, Phone and PC ecosystem is starting to get some interest and I actually like it, certainly Microsoft learn the lesson. What I want from Apple is the speed, easy of use and innovative apps, that are not tight in a proprietary ecosystem, with as few bugs as possible. This last sentence is far away from Apple as ever been. Not to mention the price tag on Apple, it is just too much expensive for what Apple gives you!

If anything, this editorial simply reiterates why investors are afriad of apple despite record profits. Apples current position was created by making knock ou of the park products; products that were so awesome the competition just didnt really exist. Today, the competition is almost as good, if not as good as apple, so apple must hit another homerun this year to maintain the profit margins that theyre used to. This is a lot of pressure for any company to be under.

Additionally, apple is competing in one of the most finnicky markets ever imagined, one where a few wrong steps over the course of a year or two can erode away the majority of apples profits. Just look at mistakes sony made in the early 2000s, or more recently with blackberry. In the coursevof a few years (largely dur to apples iphone) blackberry went from being the 2000 pound gorilla to nothing, profits evaporated almost overnight.

Like always, the pressure is on apple to innovate, in this market, a company cannot get by by saying "look at what weve done before, we beat expectations and well do it again". The company must continue to prove itself. For all the MS haters outthere, ms has managed to get themselves entrenched in a very mature market. They might ,not see apple level profits, but their profits are almost guaranteed. Theyre in a far safer position than apple.

For the past year apple has been good enough, but has not blown people away. Unless this is changed, apple could quickly become the next blackberry. This is not an enviable position for most companiies..

Let me put it to you this way. As a dev, and an owner of many IOS and OSX items, after multiple IOS "upgrades" failed to provide real folders, the ability to share data between apps (or really any other form of realistic synergy), a "finder" like tool, or even just the ability to have as many files as you want in a folder, not to mention the closed development process, "provisioning" and the other IOS dev hassles... and now, the hype is what? ... "flat icons." Good grief. Talk about a complete non-issue. Fluff. Irrelevant to anything and everything.

So I went out and bought a Droid. Perhaps Google will listen. Apple clearly doesn't.

I still make OSX apps, but IOS is pretty much dead to me as long as they keep limiting it to the most basic functionality. IOS could be so much more -- but it isn't.

You may want to take a minute and try to understand why Apple is moving away from the outdated concept of files and folders. There's plenty of literature out there. A file system shared between all applications is the biggest security risk of all. Also, we learned from usability studies that the classical hierachical file system is the #1 stumbling block for the average user. Once you understand that, it is pretty obvious why Apple is moving to innovative ways of storing and presenting content. Spotlight, Documents in the cloud, iPhoto Library, iTunes Library, Launchpad and many more all point in the same direction - good-bye file system...

Time to realize that something that was a good idea 40 years ago is no longer state of the art...

Let me put it to you this way. As a dev, and an owner of many IOS and OSX items, after multiple IOS "upgrades" failed to provide real folders, the ability to share data between apps (or really any other form of realistic synergy), a "finder" like tool, or even just the ability to have as many files as you want in a folder, not to mention the closed development process, "provisioning" and the other IOS dev hassles... and now, the hype is what? ... "flat icons." Good grief. Talk about a complete non-issue. Fluff. Irrelevant to anything and everything.

So I went out and bought a Droid. Perhaps Google will listen. Apple clearly doesn't.

I still make OSX apps, but IOS is pretty much dead to me as long as they keep limiting it to the most basic functionality. IOS could be so much more -- but it isn't.

You may want to take a minute and try to understand why Apple is moving away from the outdated concept of files and folders. There's plenty of literature out there. A file system shared between all applications is the biggest security risk of all. Also, we learned from usability studies that the classical hierachical file system is the #1 stumbling block for the average user. Once you understand that, it is pretty obvious why Apple is moving to innovative ways of storing and presenting content. Spotlight, Documents in the cloud, iPhoto Library, iTunes Library, Launchpad and many more all point in the same direction - good-bye file system...

Time to realize that something that was a good idea 40 years ago is no longer state of the art...

Well said!

"Swift generally gets you to the right way much quicker." - auxio -

"The perfect [birth]day -- A little playtime, a good poop, and a long nap." - Tomato Greeting Cards -

If anything, this editorial simply reiterates why investors are afriad of apple despite record profits. Apples current position was created by making knock ou of the park products; products that were so awesome the competition just didnt really exist. Today, the competition is almost as good, if not as good as apple, so apple must hit another homerun this year to maintain the profit margins that theyre used to. This is a lot of pressure for any company to be under.]

The problem is that the author of this article simply forgets history.

Apple has ALWAYS been under a cloud of doubt as far as investors and analysts have been concerned. Anyone who has followed Apple for any length of time has hear thousands of stories about how Apple is dying. Or Apple can't keep up its pace. Or Apple's glory days are over. Or Apple is no longer relevant. Or any of a thousand other unfounded whines.

It's just par for the course.

"I'm way over my head when it comes to technical issues like this"Gatorguy 5/31/13

I assure you all: you would not be happy with induction charging for at least the following reasons:

1) When charging from a cable, one can still easily hold the phone and do whatever he wishes while it charges: type, play games, talk on the phone (I know, no one does this anymore), leave it next to you on the bed for a sleep cycle monitor…etc. Why would anyone want to hold an induction pad to the back of the phone to use it while charging it? This is the Number one deal breaker for inductive charging

2) Cable charging works great in a moving car or boat, the iPhone would slip off an inductive charger frequently.

3) Inductive charging is is inefficient—current iPhones can be charged with tiny solar panels (camping, sailboats etc—yes many of us do this.)

4) Inductive charging is slower, who the hell wants that?!?

5) Cord sync is still faster and more reliable. What if your phone bricks and needs a full software restore?

Quote:

Originally Posted by herbapou

Induce Charging:
I wish Apple would now do induce charging since we don't need to sync with a cable anymore. I would prefer to just install pad, hide cables and just put my device on them for charging.

Apple designs and builds its own hardware to match its software (or is it the other way around?) Human nature being what it is, is reluctant to embrace change and learn new things -- revolutionary software needs to be drip-fed and that is something Apple understands better than any other tech company. Wearable computing means different things to different people -- to some it means being able to listen on a BT headset and talking to your wrist, to others it's being able to project a phone keypad on your palm and using that as your dial-pad.

How come no one is questioning the car industry why we don't have flying cars that run on hydrogen power? If a flying car was as affordable as the car I drive, I'd buy one. And has anyone noticed that even movies which depict the future still have some sort of roadways upon which these wheel-less cars hover, rather than free flying cars?

All I want is an iMac type computer which can hold 4 high capacity hard drives. Come on Apple, give us a new Mac Pro based around a 30-inch screen.

The ignorant are saddled with operating on faith. It's like being a party line Democrat or Republican. Or Christian for that matter. Reasonably foolish behavior unless you still live in a cave and fear those strange noises in the night.

What separates Einstein from most scientists, I have always thought, was his attitude. He felt the problem out instinctively, more like a poet or philosopher than a scientist. Essentially, when he worked on a problem he used his instinct and intuition more than most scientist I've seen. Sort of similar, in the same way, to how Jobs is different to most entrepreneurs.

Two things separated him. One was that he was a lone genius, these days when a new particle is discovered there'll be 450 names on the paper. But it was his peculiar tenacity that distinguishes him the most I think. Every other physicist when confronted with the curious fact that inertial mass was precisely the same as gravitational mass, just went... 'isn't that strange', and moved on to something else. But for Einstein, little things like that really bugged him. He thought about it for 10 years, and out of that thinking emerged a completely new paradigm that consigned to the scrapheap, everything everyone thought they knew about the universe. That was general relativity.

The ignorant are saddled with operating on faith. It's like being a party line Democrat or Republican. Or Christian for that matter. Reasonably foolish behavior unless you still live in a cave and fear those strange noises in the night.

I don't disagree in general but not sure of the context for this post in this thread? You are not comparing my worship of Apple to a religion are you?

From Apple ][ - to new Mac Pro I've owned them all.Long on AAPL so biased"Google doesn't sell you anything, Google just sells you!"

I'm already predicting WWDC will be a failure with tech and general media. If Apple doesn't turn iOS into Android they'll bitch and whine about it. If Apple does add some Android like features like widgets they'll bitch and whine that Apple isn't being innovative, they're just copying Google. And either way someone will accuse them of copying Microsoft because apparently Microsoft invented color and "flat" design. Oh and someone will accuse Apple of ripping off the Android font, even though that's a rip off of several other fonts, and Apple has been using Helvetia for a long time now. Won't matter, it will still be called a ripoff of MicrosoftGoogle. And the fans that don't like it will whine that Tim Cook needs too be fired, Jony Ive demoted back to hardware design only and Scott Forstall brought back to "save" Apple.

The so-called tech press miss the obvious, that launching the next OSX and iOS7 simultaneously means something and is hard. New products mean incremental OS launches which slows down the major OS development cycle. I'm pretty sure the product gap is deliberate to get OSX and iOS7 in sync, not a lack of innovation in the wings, and I'm really curious to see what is announced this week.

(Thinking about the conference subtitle "where a whole new world is developing" and the translucent overlapping colour patches, maybe the distinction between OSX and iOS is blurring...)Edited by y2an - 6/9/13 at 6:39am

I assure you all: you would not be happy with induction charging for at least the following reasons:

You mean YOU would be unhappy. Some of us would not :)

Quote:

1) When charging from a cable, one can still easily hold the phone and do whatever he wishes while it charges:

That's a valid point, especially if you let the phone get low on charge. Interestingly, an inductive charger makes that less likely (at least in my case), because I'm more likely to plop the phone on it any chance I got.

Quote:

2) Cable charging works great in a moving car or boat, the iPhone would slip off an inductive charger frequently.

Nope, not if it also has magnets like the Palm Touchstone had. The phone aligns and stays at a nice viewing angle.

My son-in-law kept a Touchstone at home, at the office, and in his car. He loved being able to just grab and go without worrying about unplugging.

Quote:

5) Cord sync is still faster and more reliable. What if your phone bricks and needs a full software restore?

Then you use a cord. Inductive charging doesn't mean cables are no longer an option.

I think most people think of those mats when they hear inductive charging. Those of us who had the Palm Pre and the Touchstone charger have a totally different concept, and know how luxurious and useful it was.

I assure you all: you would not be happy with induction charging for at least the following reasons:

1) When charging from a cable, one can still easily hold the phone and do whatever he wishes while it charges: type, play games, talk on the phone (I know, no one does this anymore), leave it next to you on the bed for a sleep cycle monitor…etc. Why would anyone want to hold an induction pad to the back of the phone to use it while charging it? This is the Number one deal breaker for inductive charging

2) Cable charging works great in a moving car or boat, the iPhone would slip off an inductive charger frequently.

3) Inductive charging is is inefficient—current iPhones can be charged with tiny solar panels (camping, sailboats etc—yes many of us do this.)

4) Inductive charging is slower, who the hell wants that?!?

5) Cord sync is still faster and more reliable. What if your phone bricks and needs a full software restore?

All the good reasons. I wouldn't touch it for 4) alone. You save time like what? A few seconds difference between placing it on the pad or sticking cable to it but you waste much more time waiting for it to be full. Fools.Edited by matrix07 - 6/9/13 at 6:57am

The so-called tech press miss the obvious, that launching the next OSX and iOS7 simultaneously means something and is hard. New products mean incremental OS launches which slows down the major OS development cycle. I'm pretty sure the product gap is deliberate to get OSX and iOS7 in sync, not a lack of innovation in the wings, and I'm really curious to see what is announced this week.

(Thinking about the conference subtitle "where a whole new world is developing" and the translucent overlapping colour patches, maybe the distinction between OSX and iOS is blurring...)

I have exactly the same thoughts. This is going to a monumental WWDC for Apple's OSs. The hardware is secondary (albeit I want to see a new Mac Pro).

From Apple ][ - to new Mac Pro I've owned them all.Long on AAPL so biased"Google doesn't sell you anything, Google just sells you!"

I like this article, and I like to share appleinsider articles that are well written, but when you add things like "Google's hobbyist Android platform", it turns this into a name calling territory.

Also, why doesn't the chart show the number of Google accounts? I believe that number is on par with what FB has. Comparing the number of credit cards on file would be a better metric.

Well, it is what it is.

If you honestly think about the Android platform, how it became what it is today, how it is forked and inconsistent, you would agree that it is fact a hobbyist Android platform. I would not call it a Frankenstein platform just yet and hopefully it won't get to that. But still, it is what it is.